Replacement consumable unit management apparatus and image forming apparatus
Active Publication Date: 2011-12-22
KONICA MINOLTA BUSINESS TECH INC
View PDF3 Cites 19 Cited by
- Summary
- Abstract
- Description
- Claims
- Application Information
AI Technical Summary
Benefits of technology
[0027]The preferred embodiments of the present invention have been developed in view of the above-mentioned and / or other problems in the related art. The Preferred embodiments of the present invention can significantly improve upon existing methods and / or apparatuses.
[0028]It is an object of the present invention to provide replacement consumable unit management apparatuses which contribute to saving the costs of delivery without causing the costs of stock check, the costs of stock keeping, and bad user experience, by determining a right replacement consumable unit and a right delivery address, and outputting a delivery instruction accordingly.
[0029]It is another object of the present invention to provide an image forming apparatus which contributes to saving the costs of delivery without causing the costs of stock check, the costs of stock keeping, and bad user experience, by determining a right replacement consumable unit and a right delivery address, and outputting a delivery instruction accordingly.
Problems solved by technology
However, while acquiring a benefit from saving the costs of the labor to handle order transactions, the manufacturer still pay the costs of delivering a replacement toner cartridge, using an automatic order and delivery system in which a management apparatus automatically places an order for it based on a condition about remaining toner level (for example, toner near empty information or toner cartridge replacement information).
If it is determined around at the same time that a service engineer should be sent to a user's place to replace a consumable unit such as a transfer belt having ended its life and an instruction to deliver a replacement toner cartridge should be outputted according to the need, there possibly will be inconveniences as to be described in the following cases.
Receiving the replacement toner cartridge, without noticing that the toner cartridge has been replaced with a new one, the user may further replace the new toner cartridge with the received replacement toner cartridge, wasting the toner almost fully contained in the new toner cartridge.
However, it would be troublesome for them to check whether or not a delivery instruction has been outputted and operate the delivery system to correct a stock quantity if it has been outputted, everytime after replacing both a transfer belt unit and a toner cartridge, or they probably would even forget going through that process.
Receiving the replacement toner cartridge and noticing that the toner cartridge has not been replaced with a new one, the user may be unhappy with that the service engineer did not care about the toner cartridges.
As described above, the inconveniences: the costs of stock check, the costs of stock keeping, and bad user experience possibly will be caused.
The same holds true in this case, too; the same inconveniences possibly will be caused since such a service engineer also may replace both a transfer belt unit and a toner cartridge with new ones or replace only a transfer belt unit with a new one, before the user receives a replacement toner cartridge.
Method used
the structure of the environmentally friendly knitted fabric provided by the present invention; figure 2 Flow chart of the yarn wrapping machine for environmentally friendly knitted fabrics and storage devices; image 3 Is the parameter map of the yarn covering machine
View moreImage
Smart Image Click on the blue labels to locate them in the text.
Smart ImageViewing Examples
Examples
Experimental program
Comparison scheme
Effect test
specific example-b
[0152]In this specific example, when the toner cartridge 70Y, 70M, 70C, or 70K is replaced with a new one, one of the other toner cartridges is in between the state of “empty (permit printing)” and “near empty”.
[0153]For example, the table of FIG. 14 indicates the states of the remaining toner levels of the toner cartridges 70Y, 70M, 70C, and 70K and the states of the stocks of replacement toner cartridges of the respective colors, when the toner cartridge 70K of Black (K) is replaced with a new one.
[0154]More specifically, when the toner cartridge 70K of Black (K) is replaced with a new one, the remaining toner information of the toner cartridge 70K of Black (K) is “full” and the stock information of the same is “Δ”. As for the toner cartridge 70C of Cyan (C), the remaining toner information is “normal” and the stock information is “◯”; as for the toner cartridge 70M of Magenta (M), the remaining toner information is “near empty” and the stock information is “◯”; and as for the ton...
the structure of the environmentally friendly knitted fabric provided by the present invention; figure 2 Flow chart of the yarn wrapping machine for environmentally friendly knitted fabrics and storage devices; image 3 Is the parameter map of the yarn covering machine
Login to View More PUM
Login to View More Abstract
A replacement consumable unit management apparatus is provided with: a receiver which receives consumable unit replacement information indicating that one consumable unit of one color or more than one consumable unit of different colors has been replaced with a new one, from one or more than one image forming apparatus which the replacement consumable unit management apparatus can access via a communication circuit; a consumable unit manager which manages the remaining amount information or the life information of the one or more than one consumable unit, and stock information indicating the states of the stocks of replacement consumable units for the one or more than one consumable unit; a determiner which, if the receiver receives the consumable unit replacement information while a consumable unit which cannot be replaced with a new one because of no stock and a consumable unit whose remaining amount information or life information is smaller than a first predetermined value are both used at the same place as the new consumable unit most recently loaded, makes a first determination that a first replacement consumable unit of the same color as the consumable unit which cannot be replaced with a new one because of no stock and a second consumable unit of the same color as the consumable unit whose remaining amount information or life information is smaller than the first predetermined value should be delivered together; and a transmitter which outputs a delivery instruction as determined by the determiner.
Description
[0001]This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119 to Japanese Patent Application No. 2010-141265 filed on Jun. 22, 2010 and Japanese Patent Application No. 2010-173128 filed on Jul. 30, 2010, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]1. Field of the Invention[0003]The present invention relates to: a replacement consumable unit management apparatus which determines a right replacement consumable unit and a right delivery address when a consumable unit loaded on an image forming apparatus is replaced with a new one; and an image forming apparatus which determines a right replacement consumable unit or a right delivery address when a consumable unit loaded on the image forming apparatus itself or another image forming apparatus is replaced with a new one.[0004]2. Description of the Related Art[0005]The following description sets forth the inventor's knowledge of related art and problems therein and shou...
Claims
the structure of the environmentally friendly knitted fabric provided by the present invention; figure 2 Flow chart of the yarn wrapping machine for environmentally friendly knitted fabrics and storage devices; image 3 Is the parameter map of the yarn covering machine
Login to View More Application Information
Patent Timeline
Login to View More IPC IPC(8): G03G15/01
CPCG03G15/5079G03G15/556G03G21/1878G03G15/553
InventorKAWAI, ATSUSHIOKUNISHI, KAZUO
OwnerKONICA MINOLTA BUSINESS TECH INC